BATF director-nominee catches flak from judge

Posted by David Hardy · 26 December 2007 10:01 AM

Story here. Basically, the federal sentencing guidelines provide for stiffer sentences as illegal conduct, well, gets bigger. If a guy defrauds the government out of a million, penalties are a lot worse than if he only takes ten thousand. The judge, in sentencing a contractor for fraud in relation to the flawed "Big Dig" tunnel, notes that Sullivan's US Atty office failed to investigate just how much the guy had swindled from the government, even tho it had two people who had turned state's evidence, and the defendant had boasted of ripping off the government fo 18 years. As it was, there was only evidence of an $80,000 fraud, and the judge had to sentence him to 15 months. The judge added that there was evidence the total frauds in the Big Dig went from $3 to 15 billion, yet there had been few prosecutions.